MYTH CONCEPTIONS m-2

by Robert Asprin

  "I remember," I nodded.

  "Well, it seems Claude has decided he needs to up the ante if he's going to get a promotion out of this. Overnight we've become ‘armed opposition ... must be subdued forcefully!' Neat, huh?"

  I swallowed hard.

  "Does that mean they'll be moving in reinforcements?" I asked, trying to sound casual.

  "Not a chance, kid." Aahz winked. "Claude there has turned down every offer of assistance that came down the line. He keeps insisting he can handle it with the company he's commanding."

  "I'd say he's got his neck way, way out," Gus commented.

  "... and we're just the ones to chop it off for him," Aahz finished.

  "Where's Ajax?" I asked, changing the subject.

  "Down at the forest line picking out his firing point," Gus replied. "Don't worry, boss. He's awake."

  Actually, that wasn't my worry concerning Ajax at all. In my mind's eye, I could still see his angry stance when I called him a coward the night before.

  "Mornin', youngster," the bowman hailed, emerging from the bush. "Think I got us a place all picked out."

  "Hi, Ajax," I replied. "Say... um... when you get a minute, I'd like to talk to you about last night."

  "Think nothin' of it," Ajax assured me with a grin. "I've plum fergot about it already."

  There was a glint in his eye that contradicted his words, but if he was willing to pretend nothing had happened, I'd go along with it for now.

  "I hate to interrupt," Aahz interrupted, "but I think friend Claude's just about ready to make his move."

  Sure enough, the distant encampment was lining up in a marching formation. The hand-drawn wagons were packed and aligned, with the escort troops arrayed to the front and sides. The signal tower, despite its appearance, was apparently also portable and was being pushed along at the rear of the formation by several sweating soldiers.

  "Late!" Ajax sneered. "I tell ya, youngster, armies are the same in any dimension."

  "Okay, kid," Aahz said briskly. "Do your stuff. It's about time we got into position."

  I nodded and closed my eyes for concentration. With a few strokes of my mental paintbrush, I altered Gus's features until the gargoyle was the mirror image of myself.

  "Pretty good," Ajax commented critically, looking from Gus to me and back again.

  I repeated the process, returning Aahz to his "dubious character" disguise.

  "Well, we're off," Aahz waved. "Confusion to the enemy!"

  Today's plan called for Gus substituting for me. The logic was that should anything go wrong, his stone flesh would not only keep him from harm, but also serve as a shield to defend Aahz.

  Somehow it didn't seem right to me, to remain behind in relative safety while sending someone else to take my risks for me. It occurred to me that perhaps I had called the wrong person "coward" last night when speaking with Ajax.

  The bowman seemed to accept the arrangement without question, however.

  "Follow me, youngster," he cackled. "I don't want to miss any of this!"

  With that, he turned and plunged into the brush, leaving me little choice but to trail along behind.

  Fortunately, Ajax's chosen vantage point wasn't far. Old or not, I found he set a wicked pace.

  Stringing his bow, he crouched and waited, chuckling softly in anticipation.

  Settling in beside him, I took a moment to check the energy lines, the invisible streams of energy magicians draw their power from. There were two strong lines nearby, one air, one ground, which was good. While Aahz had taught me how to store the energies internally, with the amount of action scheduled for the day, I wanted all the power I could get.

  We could see Aahz and Gus striding with great dignity toward the selected combat point. The opposing force watched them in frozen silence as they took their places.

  For a moment, everyone stood in tableau. Then Claude turned to his force and barked out an order. Immediately a half dozen archers broke from the formation and fanned out on either side of the wagons. Moving with slow deliberation, they each drew and cocked an arrow, then leveled the bows at the two figures blocking the company's progress. I concentrated my energies.

  Claude shouted something at our comrades. They remained motionless.

  I concentrated.

  The bowmen loosed their missiles. Gus threw up one hand dramatically.

  The arrows stopped in mid-air and fell to the ground.

  The bowmen looked at each other in amazement. Claude barked another order at them. They shakily drew and fired another barrage.

  This one was more ragged than the first, but I managed to stop it as well.

  "Nice work, youngster," Ajax exclaimed gleefully. "That's got ‘em going."

  Sure enough, the neat ranks of soldiers were rippling as the men muttered back and forth among themselves. Claude noted it, too, and ordered his bowmen back into the ranks.

  Round one to us!

  My elation was short-lived, though. The soldiers were drawing their swords now. The two groups assigned to guarding the sides of the wagon pivoted forward, forming two wings ready to engulf our teammates. As further evidence of Claude's nervousness, he even had the troops assigned to pulling the wagons leave their posts and move up to reinforce the center of his line.

  That's what we were waiting for.

  "Now, Ajax!" I hissed. "Arch ‘em high."

  "I remember, youngster," the archer grinned. "I'm ready when you are."

  I waited until he raised his bow, then concentrated an intense beam of energy at a point a few inches in front of his bow.

  It was like the candle-lighting exercise, and it worked as well now as it had when we had tried it last night.

  As each shaft sped from Ajax's bow, it burst into flames and continued on its flight.

  Again and again with incredible speed the bowman sent his missiles hissing through my ignition point. It required all my concentration to maintain the necessary stream of energy, moving it occasionally as his point of aim changed.

  Finally, he dropped his bow back to his side. "That oughta do it, youngster," he grinned.

  "Take a look."

  I did. There in the distance, behind the-soldiers' lines, thin plumes of smoke were rising from the wagons. In a few moments, Claude's supply company would be without supplies.

  If we had a few moments! As we watched, the men began to advance on Aahz and Gus, their swords gleaming in the sun, "Think we'd better do something about that!" Ajax muttered, raising his bow again.

  "Wait a second, Ajax!" I ordered, squinting at the distant figures.

  There had been a brief consultation between Aahz and Gus, then the gargoyle stepped back and began gesturing wildly at his companion.

  It took me a moment, but I finally got the message. With a smile, I closed my eyes and removed Aahz's disguise.

  Pandemonium reigned. The soldiers in the front ranks took one look at the demon opposing them and stampeded for the rear, half trampling the men behind them. As word spread through the formation, it became a rout, though I seriously doubt those in the rear knew what they were running from.

  If anyone noticed the burning wagons, they didn't slow once.

  "Whooee!" Ajax exclaimed, thumping me on the back. "That did it. Look at ‘em run. You'd think those fellers never seed a Pervert before."

  "They probably haven't," I commented, trying to massage some feeling back into my shoulder.

  "You know," the bowman drawled, squinting at the scene below, "I got me an idea. Them fellers ran off so fast they fergot to signal to anybody. Think we should do it for em?"

  "How?" I asked.

  "Well," he grinned. "I know the signals, and you're a magician. If I told you what signal to run up, could you do it? Without anybody holdin' it?"

  "Sure could," I agreed. "What'll we need for the signal?"

  "Lemme think," he frowned. "We'll have to get a skull, and a couple of pieces of red cloth, and a black ball, an-"

  "Wait a minute, Aja
x," I said, holding up a hand. "I think there's an easier signal they'll understand. Watch this."

  I sent one more blast of energy out, and the tower platform burst into flames. "Think they'll get the message?" I smiled. Ajax stared at the burning tower for a moment. "Yer pretty good at that, youngster," he murmured finally. "Throwin' fire that far." "Well," I began modestly, "we magicians can-" " ‘Course," he continued. "If you can do that, then you didn't really need me and Blackie to handle those wagons, did you?" Too late I realized my mistake.

  "Ajax, I-"

  "Kinda strange, you goin' to all that trouble jes' to convince me I'm not useless."

  "You're not useless," I barked. "Just because sometimes you're not necessary doesn't mean you're useless. I may be young, but I'm old enough to know that."

  Ajax regarded me for a moment, then he suddenly smiled.

  "Danged if you aren't right, youngest. .. Skeeve," he laughed. "Guess I knew it, but plum fergot it there fer a while. Let's go get some wine from that cask strapped to your dragon. I'd like to thank you proper fer remindin' me."

  We headed back to camp together.

  Chapter Twenty:

  "Chain of command is the backbone of military structure and must be strictly obeyed."

  -F. CHRISTIAN

  THE mood back at the camp was understandably celebratory. If I had had any hopes for joining in the festivities, however, they were dashed when Aahz hailed me.

  "Over here, kid!" he waved. "We've got some planning to do!"

  "That's the other side o' bein' a general, youngster," Ajax murmured sympathetically. "Taint all speeches and glory. You go on ahead. I'll do my drinkin' with the boys."

  With a jerk of his head, he indicated Gus and Brockhurst who were already at the wine. Tanda was waiting for me with Aahz. That made my choice a little easier.

  "Okay, Ajax," I smiled. "I'll catch up with you in a little bit."

  "Congratulations, handsome!" Tanda winked as I joined them. "That was as neat a bit of work as I've seen in a long time."

  "Thanks, Tanda," I blushed.

  "I see you and Ajax are on speaking terms again," Aahz said, regarding me with cocked eyebrows. "That's not a bad trick in itself. How did you do it?"

  "We ... um ... we had a long talk," I replied vaguely. "You said we had some planning to do?"

  "More like a briefing." Aahz admitted. "Tanda here brought along a few special effects items I think you should know about."

  I had completely forgotten about Tanda's errand which had left me alone at the Bazaar. Now that I had been reminded, my curiosity soared.

  "Whatcha got, Tanda?" I asked eagerly.

  "Nothing spectacular," she shrugged. "Knowing Aahz was involved, I figured we'd be on a tight budget so I stuck to the basics."

  "Just show him, huh?" Aahz growled. "Spare us the editorial comments."

  She stuck her tongue out at him but produced a small cloth sack from her belt.

  "First off," she began, "I thought we could use a little flash powder. It never fails to impress the yokels."

  "Flash powder," I said carefully.

  "You set fire to it," Aahz supplied. "It burns fast and gives you a cloud of smoke."

  "I've got about a dozen small bags of it here," Tanda continued, showing me the contents of her sack. "Various colors and sizes."

  "Can I try one?" I asked. "I've never worked with this stuff before."

  "Sure," Tanda said. She grinned, extending the sack. "They're yours to use as you see fit. You might as well know what you've got."

  I took the sack and carefully selected one of the small bags from its interior.

  "Better toss it to the ground, kid," Aahz cautioned. "Some folks can set it off in their hand, but that takes practice. If you tried it that way now, you'd probably lose a few fingers."

  I obediently tossed the bag on the ground a few feet away. Watching it curiously, I focused a quick burst of energy on it.

  There was a bright flash of light accompanied by a soft pop. Blinking my eyes, I looked at where the bag had been. A small cloud of green smoke hung in the air, slowly dissipating in the breeze.

  "That's neat!" I exclaimed, reaching into the sack again.

  "Take it easy," Aahz warned. "We don't have that much of the stuff."

  "Oh! Right, Aahz," I replied, feeling a little sheepish. "What else do you have, Tanda?"

  "Well," she said, smiling, "I guess this would be a piece-de-resistance."

  As she spoke, she seemed to draw something from behind her back. I say "seemed" because I couldn't see anything. From her movements, she looked to be holding a rod about three feet long, but there was nothing in her grasp.

  "What is it?" I asked politely.

  For a response, she grinned and held whatever it was in front of her. Then she opened her grip and disappeared into thin air.

  "Invisibility," Aahz exclaimed. "A cloak of invisibility!"

  "Couldn't afford one," came Tanda's voice from somewhere in front of us. "I had to settle for one of these."

  What "one of these" was, it turned out, was a sheet of invisibility. It was a sheet of stiff material about three feet by seven feet. Tanda had been carrying it rolled up in a tube, and her disappearance had been caused by the sheet unrolling to its full size.

  As she and Aahz chatted excitedly about her new find, I had an opportunity to further my knowledge in the field of invisibility.

  Invisible sheets, it seems, were made of roughly the same material as invisible cloaks. Since the sheets were carried, not worn, they did not require the flexibility and softness necessary for a cloak. Consequently, they were considerably cheaper than the cloaks.

  The effect was sort of like one-way glass. When you were on the right side of an invisible sheet, you could see through it perfectly well to observe whatever or whoever was on the other side. They, however, could not see you.

  We were still discussing the potential uses of the new tool when Brockhurst hastened up to our group.

  "Hey, boss!" he called. "We've got company!"

  "Who? Where?" I asked calmly.

  "Down on the meadow," the Imp responded, pointing. "The Gremlin says there's some kind of group forming out there."

  "What Gremlin?" Aahz snarled.

  "C'mon, Aahz," Tanda called, starting off. "Let's check this out."

  There was indeed a group on the meadow. Empire soldiers all. The puzzling thing was their activity, or specifically their lack of it. They seemed to be simply standing and waiting for something.

  "What are they doing, Aahz?" I whispered as we studied the group form the concealment of the tree line.

  "They're standing and waiting," Aahz supplied. "I can see that," I said. "But what are they waiting for?"

  "Probably for us," my mentor replied.

  "For us?" I blinked. "Why?"

  "For a war council," Aahz grinned. "Look at it, kid. Aren't they doing the same thing we did when we wanted to talk? They're even standing in the same spot."

  I restudied the group in this light. Aahz was right! The enemy was calling for a war council!

  "Do you think we should go out there?" I asked nervously.

  "Sure," Aahz replied. "But not right away. Let ‘em sweat a little. They kept us waiting the first time, remember?"

  It was nearly half an hour before we stepped from the tree line and advanced across the meadow to where the soldiers stood waiting. I had taken the precaution of outfitting Aahz in his "dubious character" disguise for the conference. Myself, I was bearing the invisibility sheet before me, so that though I was walking along beside Aahz, to the soldiers it appeared he was alone.

  There were more soldiers at the meeting point than there had been at our first meeting with Claude. Even to my untrained eye, it was apparent that there were more than half a dozen officers present among the honor guard.

  "You wish a meeting?" Aahz asked haughtily, drawing to a halt before the group.

  There was a ripple of quick consultation among the soldiers.
Finally one of them, apparently the leader, stepped forward.

  "We wish to speak with your master!" he announced formally.

  "He's kinda busy right now," Aahz yawned. "Anything I can help you with?"

  The leader reddened slightly.

  "I am the commander of this sector!" he barked. "I demand to see Skeeve, commander of the defense, not his lackey!"

  I dropped one of the bags of flash powder on the ground at my feet.

  "If you insist," Aahz growled, "I'll get him. But he won't be happy."

  "I'm not here to make him happy," the leader shouted. "Now be off with you."

  "That won't be necessary," Aahz leered. "He's a magician. He hears and sees what his servants hear and see. He'll be along."

  That was my cue. I let drop the sheet of invisibility and simultaneously ignited the bag of flash powder.

  The results were spectacular.

  The soldiers, with the exception of the leader, fell back several steps. To them, it looked as if I had suddenly appeared from thin air, materializing in a cloud of red smoke.

  For me, the effect was less impressive. As the bag of flash powder went off, it was made apparent to me that watching a cloud of smoke from a distance was markedly different from standing at ground zero.

  As I was enveloped in the scarlet billows, my feeling was not of elated triumph but rather a nearly overwhelming desire to cough and sneeze.

  My efforts to suppress my reactions caused me to contort my features to the point where I must have borne more than a faint resemblance to Gus.

  "Steady, Master!" Aahz cautioned.

  "Aahz. Ah!" I gasped.

  "Do not let your anger overcome your reason," my mentor continued hastily. "They don't know the powers they trifle with."

  "I ... I did not wish to be disturbed," I managed at last, regaining my breath as the smoke dissipated.

  The leader of the group had held his ground through the entire proceedings, though he looked a bit paler and less sure of himself than when he had been dealing with just Aahz.

  "We... um... apologize for bothering you," he began uncertainly. "But there are certain matters requiring your immediate attention... specifically the war we are currently engaged in."